I came with Asou san to a café a short walk from our workplace toward the station. It was a stylish place with an adult atmosphere, but since smoking was allowed, which is rare these days, most of the customers were middle aged men.
Thanks to sitting in a private room in the back, the smoke from other seats didn't bother me much, but I still wondered why she chose a place like this.
That question was soon answered.
"Phew. A smoke after work is great."
"Excuse me, but that's clearly against school rules."
"Ahaha, you're so serious about things like that."
"I'd like to know where exactly you think I'm not serious."
As soon as she closed the private room door, Asou san lit a cigarette she had taken from her pocket. I don't care if other people smoke or drink, but seeing a fellow high school student smoke so openly didn't sit well with me.
"So what did you want to talk about? Hurry up and tell me, it smells like smoke in here."
"Ah, sorry, sorry. But I can only smoke here. Just bear with me for this one cigarette, okay?"
"I suppose I don't mind. But have you been smoking for a long time?"
"Well, I only started recently."
She didn't look apologetic at all while smoking, but she smiled a little awkwardly at my question.
"Influenced by a guy?"
"Hmm, you're sharp as always. Honestly, Aoyama kun, are you on your second playthrough of life?"
"If I were on my second playthrough, I'd live more skillfully."
"Ahaha, I guess that's true. Yeah, you're right. I recently developed feelings for someone. He's a university student."
"Oh, that's nice. Are you dating?"
"No, well, how do I put it... we're friends with benefits, I guess?"
Asou san said that, took a deep drag of her shortened cigarette, and blew out a large puff of smoke.
"Friends with benefits, huh."
"Yeah. I obviously go to see him because I like him, but for him, it's more like he just wants to get laid. I started smoking because he does, and I thought if we smoked together, he might start to like me, but now I can't quit."
"So what do you want to ask me?"
"Do you think a guy who treats a girl like a friend with benefits is scum?"
She put out her cigarette and exhaled those words along with the last puff of smoke.
"Generally speaking, I suppose he is."
"Right, right? He knows how I feel, but treating me like a friend with benefits is so scummy, isn't it? He only contacts me when he wants to do it, and he never messages me otherwise."
She seemed unusually flustered and complaining, and at first I didn't really understand what she wanted to say.
But I gradually got it.
Basically, she wants him to stop. She wants to hear that a guy who toys with someone's feelings is scum. That she should quit such a guy. That being friends with benefits is no good.
"But if both parties are fine with it, isn't that okay?"
"Huh?"
"Sorry. I just mean, as long as you can be with him, that's all you care about, right?"
"That's true, but still."
"If the guy is comfortable with your current relationship and that's why he meets you, then if you ask for more, won't he just lose interest?"
As I spoke to Asou san, a complicated feeling I couldn't explain ran through me.
Without understanding what it was, I continued.
"Of course, I don't think that kind of guy is good either. But even if I told you to stop, you wouldn't be able to hate him, right?"
"Right. Honestly, you're strangely mature, Aoyama kun."
"I just don't think you need to be fixated on the form of the relationship. If you hate him, or if meeting him hurts, then you just shouldn't meet him."
"I understand that in my head, but not everyone can be as dry as you are."
She reached for a second cigarette, but stopped.
"You're not going to smoke?"
"I'll pass. Last time we kissed, he told me my breath smelled like cigarettes."
"So you're going to see him after this."
"Ahaha, you really see through everything. At this rate, I can't tell who's the senior here."
She put the cigarettes back in her pocket and left the room first.
When I followed, she had already paid the bill. "Thanks for today," she said.
She gave me a strained smile and then left.